Perhaps the biggest NFL story of the first month of 2026 was that former New England Patriots head coach and living legend Bill Belichick did not become a first-ballot Pro Football Hall of Fame selection.
Ahead of the Labor Day holiday weekend, the Hall of Fame confirmed that its selection process won’t be the same moving forward.
How will players now be evaluated for Hall of Fame selection?
On Friday, Jeff Legwold of ESPN and others shared that the Hall of Fame has made what it referred to as “improvements” to its selection process.
“The Hall’s board of selectors will be reduced from 50 to 28, as 25 members of the selection committee will be voting members with three alternates,” Legwold wrote. “And there will no longer be at least one selector in each of the home markets of the 32 teams in the league. …All players will also now be considered in one pool, rather than either ‘modern era’ or ‘seniors’ — players who had their modern era eligibility expire after 25 years. Players will be evaluated as one group, as players would still be eligible five years after their retirement but simply remain on the list of all eligible players after that.”
The process for selecting Hall of Famers went mostly ignored by casual football fans until the Belichick news generated daily discussions on sports programs leading up to Super Bowl LX.
Multiple reports mentioned that Belichick’s involvement in the “Spygate” and “Deflategate” scandals when he was with the Patriots was brought up during deliberations among voters before he was snubbed.
It was subsequently suggested that former Patriots quarterback and seven-time Super Bowl champion Tom Brady could receive similar treatment from voters when he becomes Hall of Fame eligible in 2028. Fair or not, the perception now exists that the Hall of Fame made a preemptive strike regarding voters who may want to send a message about Brady’s career a couple of years down the road.
Could there be more Hall of Famers than before in future classes?
“There will continue to be Coach and Contributor categories,” Legwold added. “The Contributor category has been expanded from those who ‘contributed to the game outside of playing or coaching’ to the consideration of a candidate’s full football resume that may include playing, coaching and other contributions. And now each year, after voting reductions, a list of 13 players, one coach and one contributor — 15 in all — will be considered for enshrinement. The Hall said an induction class could now be between three and seven members.”
The fact that the Hall of Fame revealed this information on what is referred to as a “news dump” holiday Friday could lead one to believe the Hall would prefer for this story to get buried. Regardless, it could be interesting to hear what Belichick and Brady have to say about this development.
